Home Page

Free Admission Wasn’t Useful But Will It Become Necessary?

August 9, 2021

by:

Joe Patti

According to CityLab Berliners are returning to the city’s museums, with credit being given to free admission Sundays. Sixty-seven museums are offering free admission which is part of a larger effort to explore ways in which people can assemble during the pandemic.

Participating museums are required to follow hygiene and distancing rules. Offering free entrance to the museums alone won’t bring back crowds to the city center — people need to feel it is safe to visit museums and public places again, said Klaus Lederer, Berlin’s Senator for Culture and Europe.

[…]

The Museum Sunday is also one of several cultural happenings in Berlin that has found a way to attract visitors amid a sustained global health crisis. Events like the Berlin Art Week, the open-air event Draussenstadt and the Clubculture reboot weekend, a pilot project to experiment how partying can work during a pandemic, are taking place in Berlin this summer.

The free admission Sundays were being planned prior to the pandemic as a way to attract a broader audience. In the US at least research has shown that free admission doesn’t really attract new visitors, but rather attract those who already visit the museum thereby delaying their next potential paid visit by a year or two. Hearing about a similar plan in Berlin made me wonder if the same held true for Germany or if there are are more nuanced dynamics at work there.

This being said, given that people have had 18+ months of not attending public events, a situation that may extend into the near future, it may be necessary to offer free admission to entice the return of those who would normally visit. What that portends for the future remains to be seen.

Arts Facilities, Audience Relations, Building Public Will For Arts And Culture, Marketing/PR

2 Comments

Is Economic Impact Declining As Most Important Measure of Value?

August 4, 2021

by:

Joe Patti

As I go about arguing against using measures like economic impact and test scores for valuing the arts, I occasionally get push back from people who note that for better or for worse dollars and test score are quantifiable and compelling and therefore are what will matter most to policy makers, funders, and individual donors.

The thing is, we know that a lot of people value things that aren’t so easily measured but are deemed to be important. Scott Walters recently posted a reaction to a CNN story about the impact working from home has been having:

This obsession with "the economy" distorts the issue. Is working from home good for human beings? Is it good for the environment? Instead, we focus on latte consumption. Come on, @CNN, THINKhttps://t.co/qH4yKTVv2b

— Scott Walters (@walt828) August 3, 2021

If your browser is blocking the image, it reads: “This obsession with “the economy” distorts the issue. Is working from home good for human beings? Is it good for the environment? Instead, we focus on latte consumption. Come on, @CNN, THINK https://t.co/qH4yKTVv2b ”

We know from research conducted by projects like Creating Connection that people view participation in arts events has having positive associations with interpersonal relationships, physical and mental health, social good, self-improvement along with other benefits.

With so much in the news about people rethinking their relationship with work and its place in their lives and stories of athletes asserting boundaries about the activities in which they are willing to participate, this is a time when people are recognizing that customary process and values may no longer be relevant. Or perhaps it is better said that people are questioning whether they continue subsuming their existing values of health and well-being to economic opportunity and test scores.

In this there is an opportunity to work on reframing the terms in which the arts are valued so that they resonate in empathy with the introspection and questioning about values and norms which is occurring.

Audience Relations, Building Public Will For Arts And Culture, State of the Arts, Working In The Arts

No Comments

The Logo May Be A Little Different, But The Brand Remains The Same

August 3, 2021

by:

Joe Patti

I had a post appear on ArtsHacker this week that dealt with the concept of rebranding. In the post I cite an article by Mark Ritson arguing for revitalization of a brand rather than rebranding. Ritson’s position is that unless legally required to engage in rebranding, there is more to lose than gain by rebranding. He uses the UK National Lottery as a case study to make his point. I am not going to go too much into his reasoning behind revitalization here. I encourage you to read my ArtsHacker piece and perhaps move on to Ritson’s article.

The part that really got me thinking was his statement that the secret to maintaining a consistent brand was flexibility and change. His point was that the value of a brand is more related to a promise being made and not proportionally related to the quality of advertising and graphics. (my emphasis)

Step three, don’t reproduce the executions and approaches of the past – despite their proven impact. Time has moved on. Instead, ask what these key words or imperatives demand of you in 2022. That question is crucial because, although you don’t change the DNA of a brand when you revitalise it, you do have to acknowledge one of the core paradoxes of branding: consistency demands change.

[…]

If your beauty brand is all about health and nature, plastic packaging with a picture of waterfall and a product packed full of parabens might have worked once upon a time. But wake up and smell the future! Doing the same thing, over a long period of time – ironically – often makes you ultimately inconsistent with your stated brand position.

As I comment in the ArtsHacker post, if the organization identifies a problem to be solved and suggested changes are countered with “that is what people want/the way we have always done it,” that is probably the exact area you should be evaluating. It may not be that your beloved holiday tradition needs to be scrapped, but how it is conducted may no longer feel as relevant to your community as it once did.

Take a look and think about it. The post-Covid world provides an opportunity to revitalize how you are perceived in the community.

Maintaining A Consistent Brand Requires Change

Audience Relations, Marketing/PR, State of the Arts, Working In The Arts

No Comments

Four Centuries of Romans Can’t Be Wrong

August 2, 2021

by:

Joe Patti

For Purpose Law Group made a post on their site advocating shared leadership models for non-profits. They note that there is an increasing recognition that a hierarchical model with a sole leader in charge does not best serve the needs for the organization. They provide a brief list of resources people can consult to learn more about shared leadership governance, but their central thesis is that for over 400 years the Roman Empire was run on a co-leadership model which existed at every level from local magistrate to the consuls at the center of the Empire.

And apparently this structure didn’t rely on the partners getting along well with each other:

“In most analyses of co-leadership,” Professor Sally observes, “the analysis is on the personalities of the partners. Yet, this cannot be the whole story….” He explains: “The fact that the Roman Republic sustained co-leadership for more than four centuries means that there were structures, norms, and behaviors that supported an immense variety of personalities in consulship, quaestorship, and so on….”

I took a look at the article written by Professor Sally in which he describes 10 features of the Roman structure which made this work.

Right at the top is that the leaders assume and depart the office on the same day according to a fixed schedule. This prevented one person from accumulating more influence than the other. If one died prematurely of illness or in battle, they were not replaced. In terms of how this translates to the modern business world, if one person departs, the other remains in the position, but only until a new duo can be found to assume the office. The individual then moves on to a different position.

Now how this would work in a small organization where there aren’t many other positions is not addressed, though there are some good examples in the text of problems dual leaders have run into when trying to agree on an shared exit strategy.

Other features of the Roman system: Each leader would take on equivalent assignments so that neither would accumulate significantly more opportunities or glory.

There were two leaders, but one office. All perks and symbols of office were shared, including space. Sally notes in modern practice companies whose co-leaders are located in different geographic areas will have an additional office space for the partner, even if it sits empty for the bulk of the year.

There are a number of other rules the Romans followed. It is pretty fascinating to read how they were followed, the conflicts that sometimes arose in the course of trying to adhere to the model as well as the crises which emerged when decisions were made to break with the practices.

This article on the Roman practice provides a different lens through which to look at piece which advocate for businesses to consider shared leadership. So often it feels like shared leadership is an innovative approach, but in fact it is more akin to reinventing the wheel.

Leadership, Working In The Arts

No Comments